Google flights take-off after acquiring ITA

Google has completed its expected takeover of airline data specialist ITA for $700 million (about £460 million in the Queen's money).

ITA is a Boston based business that specialises in flight information such as availability, flight dates and times and ticket prices.

The takeover means that we'll be seeing Google Flights, Google Flight Finder or something similarly named in the coming months - a service that is likely to rival online flight scanners like Kayak and Skyscanner.

It will also put the pressure on Bing, that offers a pretty decent travel service itself (check it out here) which, interestingly, uses some ITA data - it will be intriguing to see if Google halts this or is simply happy to make some money from Microsoft by letting it continue.

Google stated via its blog:

"While online flight search is rapidly evolving, we think there is room for more competition and greater innovation. Once we’ve completed our acquisition of ITA, we’ll work on creating new flight search tools that will make it easier for you to search for flights, compare flight options and prices and get you quickly to a site where you can buy your ticket.

"We’re confident that by combining ITA’s expertise as the leading developer of flight information software with Google’s technology we’ll be able to create great user innovations in flight search".

If Google's takeover means that it will be even easier to find the cheapest flights online then we're all for it. We're massive fans of the service Kayak currently provides, and with Google's name behind a flight checker, we're sure it's going to be a massive take-off with flight seekers. Take-off. Get it? Ha!